


Our Nature Becomes Us

by aionimica



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Death, F/M, Falling In Love, Fix-It of Sorts, Hades/Persephone AU, Healing, Life - Freeform, Married Life, Non TROS compliant, but not the way you think
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-15
Updated: 2020-03-15
Packaged: 2021-02-28 18:55:20
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,171
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23162074
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/aionimica/pseuds/aionimica
Summary: At first it may seem that the galaxy was calling Ben Solo and Rey down separate paths: to death and life.But Rey and Ben are compliments to each other, though in ways that neither of them could have predicted.O my Persephone, my goddess of death,Did you not knowThat I am your god of life?
Relationships: Kylo Ren/Rey, Rey/Ben Solo | Kylo Ren
Comments: 10
Kudos: 71
Collections: Reylo Charity Anthology: Volume 2, Reylo Hidden Gems





	Our Nature Becomes Us

**Author's Note:**

> Here is my submission for the "Reylo Charity Anthology Vol. 2" 
> 
> Thank you so much for reading and I hope you all enjoy!

_ O my Persephone, my goddess of death, _

_ Did you not know _

_ That I am your god of life? _

~

Some nights, now that all the turmoil and change in his life settled and there was a calm and steady sea instead of a raging storm, he found himself lying down, dreaming of the past. Some nights it was a direct line of what brought him to the here and now – others it was fragmented, vivid and detailed casts of memories he’d long since forgotten. Though despite the variation, some things stayed the same.

They always called him a quiet child.

A hopeful child.

Ben Solo, named for the hope of a galaxy.

A tumultuous child, but what child doesn’t go through growing pains? He listened more than he acted, which was considered strange for a child that many would not consider ‘quiet.’ The kind of child that when he made his decision, it was with completeness and purpose; one that walked before he crawled.

That burden of purpose though, was something he could never quite escape. He remembered that moment with such clarity when he first realized that there was a purpose that he didn’t quite understand. He was young, but not a child. Somewhere around that age of awareness, just before he went to live and train with Luke.

It was a night he couldn’t sleep, and he went out like he always did, to stare at the stars. It always calmed him, letting sleep slowly pool in his limbs. He stood out quietly on the balcony, looking out over Chandrila and it wasn’t until he was older that he realized what it was that spoke to him on those long nights, where he was left alone with nothing but a droid.

Life.

The pull of the Force that comes and goes with each breath. The inhale and exhale of the planet around him. Life.

_ Breathe in – _

And Death.

_ – and out _ .

They both spoke, but while death curled against his ear, whispering of darker machinations and promises of a better future, in his heart was life; a small ember fueling a furnace that he couldn’t snuff out. 

They pushed and pulled at his psyche, one luring while another whispered for him to turn the other way.

Years passed and the pull never stopped. It only turned one way or the other. Over and over, after training sessions where a droid crumpled in the corner at his expense, or when another student stared up at him, terrified of that potential in his eye, Ben found himself running out to the plains around Luke’s temple and stopping and looking up. There the breath of life came easier and smoother, but with each passing year, it was harder and harder to hear.

Until that one night.

He ran from his rooms, his uncle left behind in the rubble. Tears streamed down his cheeks as agony and rage tore across his chest. The last whisper of what he knew called out to him as he chokes out to the stars, “Save me!” – the plea of child who knows of no where else to go.

They answer with fire, burning away all he knew until he was left with naught but ash. Life gave way to the coming of death. He watched his uncle fall, the temple that he’d come to call home blow up in torrents of fire.

The rest was a long slow fall.

What he once knew and hung onto, faded into what he was to become. Kylo Ren – a man of his own making, walking down a path that called him like no other had. Blood and ash fell in his wake, and he walked with a mask that rested like a crown on his brow.

To anyone – to his knights, to Snoke – his resolve was unshaken. He was committed, strong, resolute.

But in the quiet moments that he was able to find for himself, he’d remove his helmet and take off his gloves and stare up at the emptiness of stars and ask of the Force, “Why did you leave me alone?”

He fell asleep with nothing in response, only to hear in his dreams,  _ you’re not alone. You will find your place. And your balance _ .

It never came.

And he fell farther. What else was he supposed to do? Life never answered, not when death surged in and gave him strength and reassurance. What was a breath of life when his only calling was to wrestle it under his control, snuff it if necessary.

What remained of Ben Solo breathed in life.

Kylo Ren delivered death.

And so he gave up calling to the sky and took what the Force gave, never stopping to listen.

It didn’t matter. He knew they’d only give silence in response.

Until one day when they were looking for a droid, who happened to steal a freighter that looked uncannily similar to his father’s rickety YT-1300.

“—With a girl.”

His heart froze and for a moment, Kylo Ren felt his chest contort in pain.  _ A girl _ . Lashing out, he spun around, desperate for more information about a person he had no idea existed. And yet… He knew her; knew her to be enough and knew she was what he had been looking for – the one he’d been waiting for. How could he not go find her?

They met in a garden of trees.

Even now he couldn’t forget that day. The way she walked – it was like the living Force sprung forth with each step. It was as if Takodana was crafted for her and the two of them in this moment – waiting to be found by each other.

He breathed her in. A flower blossoming under a desert sun before its spine struck his heart.

And somehow, some way, she grew stronger, as if a power – her own power – was coming to life. So he took her home.

And oh, how she defied him.

She took back her place, marked by a gash to the side of his face. Marked by her, marked  _ as hers _ . Death marred by life. How impossible it should be and yet, here she was, ready to stand defiant to him, her saber unleashed and her rage ready to strike him down.

Kylo Ren remembered the day that they stormed the old Rebel base, looking for those to bring to heel. Nothing could compare to the hate and hurt in his heart, but there it was – the smallest ember of hope wanting to find her and take her home again. That indecipherable need for her to find him again — but why the desire to find her, and to kneel?

Not that it mattered. They found nothing but a door slammed in their face. She looked on him and saw who he was – what death would do to a wellspring of life like her – and she turned the other way. And why was he surprised? The stars lied and abandoned him, just like everyone else. His balance rejected him. Why should he wait for their empty promises?

Lashing out, he embraced who he was: he was death. Life never called to him, the embers from that hope scattered across the galaxy. It was a lie – he could never be called by life, not when all he did was destroy. It was the foolish hope of a child, to ignore what he truly was – is meant to be.

But there was something still that he couldn’t ignore – a calling there in the pit of his heart, that whispered to him the sweet call of vibrance and bloom. The breath of life, floating on the wind. She still called to him even when he dared not to care; even when she stood against him, ready to tear him down with a ferocity that surprised even him.

And it was on the ruins of a machine designed to destroy life itself, that he sat, breathing in the living Force — her hands on his bare and broken skin, her life feeding him, restoring him — that he looked up and saw his death in her gaze.

Kylo Ren had died.

And now Ben Solo breathed again.

He wakes, stilling as the waking world slowly came to his senses. At least he doesn’t startle nowadays as the dreams fade, but there’s still that moment of stillness where he looks around the room and must remind himself that this is real. It was all so real – so vivid, but those memories were from long ago. Years at this point, yet still so clear in his mind. No matter. The stars shifted accordingly — their fates aligning to keep the other in check. He could reach out and touch it – as if he looks over his shoulder, he’d be able to see it, that other part of himself.

Ben shifts uncertainly as he props himself up. It didn’t matter what happened then. Only what happens now. He nearly laughs as he runs a hand through his hair. What was now? What difference did that make?

Back then he thought himself the avatar of the Dark Side – a place that called to him throughout his life.

Now?

He glances over his shoulder to where Rey stood guard. The sun casts a long shadow over her silhouette. Her hair is down more often now, half of it pulled up to keep out of her face. Grey robes wrap around her muscled frame, her saber staff hanging from her belt. The light casts her jaw in a golden light, the shadows playing against the curve of her cheeks.

The smile comes unbidden to his lips, so certain and sure that not even he can tell if it’s from a fondness he can’t explain or just a part of him. Outside the sun is setting -- ** has long days and equally long nights – and the noise from the city below them begins to slow as the foot traffic starts to fade.

Now?

Something happened when he died – when Kylo Ren was left behind and life was breathed into Ben. Something that neither have quite been able to articulate, but a moment when fate takes the shape of one and gives it to another. What else is fate supposed to do when death no longer finds its purpose in its acts? Or when perhaps its purpose was muddied from the start?

They’ve grown to know more of each other in the past few years. How she was a girl from Jakku who scavenged graves of Destroyers to survive; how she was left to fend for herself, teaching herself everything she knew.

While he was training to serve the light, she fought and did what she had to do to keep herself alive – dealing in death was a reality she had to confront at a young age. Death was just an eventuality on a planet full of bones and sand – Rey wasn’t going to let anyone but herself choose that end for her.

And when he takes in her body count, it’s more than enough to give some pause to take her to bed. He grins at that, unable to help it: she’s killed him more times than he can count.

There was the time on Endor, and then on Exogol – and that wasn’t accounting for the times they both dared to forget: a long night on Nar Shadda, where they were looking for a bounty hunter with an apparent Force Sensitive aide; a night of too many close calls and too many explanations on the flight home. She should have killed him on Starkiller. Ben remembered it so well – she wanted to kill him, readying herself for the final blow, but it was the will of the planet and the Force itself that drew them apart.

His Rey walked the galaxy with a scepter of discernment. She was power – as was he – but a power of a different kind.

His desert flower hid her thorns well, lashing out at the perfect moments to bring down a creature so much stronger. A desert flower that thrived despite what the planet gave her – living because it was not her time yet; as if she knew that intrinsically.

Yet she was astute. She was not malicious in her actions, striking down those with precision and skill. Kylo thought he was the avatar of death – what if he was merely holding the place for the one who truly knew what that meant? Kylo Ren would strike down in anger and rage, an eagerness to release pain and hate. Rey only did when she had to.

And that was the difference in them.

She dealt in death judiciously, giving in to him when the life called to him to stay their hand, though he was not free from her rule.

Though there were also the countless deaths at her hand and tongue, as she pulls him to the brink of what it means to  _ live _ , where the stars white out and all he can think of or see is her. And only her and the way she feels around him

Those come like a balm to a broken soul, holding him close as he pulls himself back together. Healing by rebuilding – and not just in the Force. Acts, deeds, and growth in areas that Ben didn’t even know was possible.

And it was in those moments that he found himself truly alive.

He learned to heal at her feet; she taught him on the floor of the  _ Falcon _ , back when they left the galaxy behind and set off to find themselves.

There were still burns and scars – fresh from each other and their escape from the Unknown Regions. There was a beauty in the way she looked that night, the way her lashes brushed against her cheeks and her lips parted as she focused and breathed.

She took his hands and held them in hers

“Now it’s your turn.” She said it expectantly, as if her example was all he needed. And in a way it was. Rewalking old paths that he thought he had once forgotten. Places that he thought were closed off forever, now opening up as he breathed the living Force into his skin.

And that was the difference between them.

Rey heals like it was a lesson. A task – a thing that must be done. She focuses, she does the deed and then moves on. But for him? For Ben? Healing became a part of him.

It’s an act of intention, of giving, of taking that place of the wounded and guiding the Force to the brokenness and focusing on how to make it whole. It’s an act of penance and an act of calling and every time he does it, he can’t believe it’s taken him this long to find this place where his soul is finally found.

And found because of her.

Just as he found her on Takodana, she found him on the grave of planets and she took him home and never let him go. She took him when he was lost and took him to the stars, where time was all they had and all they wanted. Where they could be themselves and find themselves and walk paths beyond Jedi and Sith and whatever names the galaxy wanted to place on their shoulders.

Shakily, he rouses himself from bed and goes to stand, but not before he catches himself in the mirror. There’s a fullness to his cheeks that weren’t there before – his eyes aren’t as tired, nor lost and an air of hope or perhaps eagerness on his brow. Even the way he carries himself is strange and foreign, even after all this time. He is new and himself and all that he was in ways he could never quite have expected.

And it’s when he runs his hands through his hair that he stops and lowers them and stares.

Hands. Healing hands. Hands that have killed. Hands that can do both. A man that has been both and a woman who was once his fount of life, now standing in the way between him and death.

He exhales shakily.  _ What now? _

Rey glances to him from across the way. “We go to the next planet. And the next and the next.” She walks over to him, threading her hands around his waist “And you’re going to get better at this.”

Slowly the sun sets and his Rey smiles as the heat of the abates and the cool of Ambria’s two moons rise.

“Why me?” The question comes before he can stop it, falling out on a rasping tongue and a hoarse voice.

Rey stares at him for a moment, then another, before looking up. “Why not you?” she says at last. “I couldn’t ignore you even if I tried – you occupied my every waking moment – every thought you’re there in the back of my mind. I can feel you across stars…” Her smile softens, her laugh lines pulling at the corners of her eyes. “You might have found me first. But I chose to keep you. And you can’t take that away.”

_ Nor our place in each other,  _ she whispered across the bond. And heat ran down his spine – never does it grow old, to be known.

The stars themselves and the Force itself saw where they once were and tore them apart to make them now. A boy who gave into death, only to become life; a girl stubborn enough not to die and to thrive in a place made to kill, only to become that which stares out into the world and answer when death calls.

The worlds don’t understand them, the galaxy calling them Jedi – Skywalkers – because they have no other name for what they are.

Ben kisses her forehead as she leans against him, her skin cool as it makes his blood run hot. Her hands twist, taking his; like meeting like and pushing each other apart.  _ Don’t leave, don’t leave _ – but where it comes from each of them, passing across their bond so seamlessly that it became their promise to each other.  _ I found you, I found you – I won’t let you  _ go.

And despite that, it is not fear that brings him out on their balcony tonight. Not fear that guides his gaze up to the blue-black sky, no. It’s a baser need – a part of him long since denied that can’t help but look up when he has nowhere else to turn.

“What do you want from me?” he asks up to the stars, quietly, pleading.  _ Who am I now? _

Out there in the galaxy, there was no response. For one of the first times, he realizes that it doesn’t need to.

Ben inhales slowly and closes his eyes. The world around him is calm, quiet. They sky is clear. And around him, all of life simply breathes. He is home and it sings to him.

Rey’s hand finds his. His wife – his death. She leans into him, her life.

And he smiles.

**Author's Note:**

> please leave comments and kudos, they are like author candy!!
> 
> <3 <3
> 
> you can find me on twitter @aionimica


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